City of Steamboat acquires Barn Village lot through foreclosure

Steamboat Springs  The city of Steamboat Springs has claimed a lot in Barn Village at Steamboat that the original developer of the subdivision put up as collateral for its community housing requirement.

As part of the city’s search for a suitable site for a new police station, the lot is being considered in a swap with Yampa Valley Medical Center that would allow the city to build at the corner of Pine Grove Road and Central Park Drive.

The city has a list of about 20 potential sites for a new police station.

Barn Village at Steamboat went through the city’s planning process at a time when inclusionary zoning still was part of the community housing requirements.

According to documents filed with the Routt County Clerk and Recorder’s office, the city allowed the developer, Mountain Property Development Inc., to pay a fee in lieu of $505,521.50 to satisfy the community housing requirement.

The developer did not pay the money up front and used 0.8-acre Lot 63A as collateral in a November 2009 deed of trust with the city.

City of Steamboat Springs attorney Tony Lettunich said Thursday that the city made sure at the time that it had senior rights to the land.

In the deed, Mountain Property Development was supposed to pay off the fee-in-lieu in three yearly payments with the balance being due in August 2012. The deed later was amended to make the balance due in August 2013.

The debt was not paid, and the property was foreclosed on. The city presented the note at auction, and a confirmation deed for the property was issued to the city Wednesday.

Lot 63A is split into two tax accounts and there are liens on each. While the city did not have to pay any money for the deed to the property, it will have to pay the back taxes on the lot to clear it, which are a little more than $10,000.

The lot was appraised at $500,000 in August 2009, but a December 2013 appraisal puts the current value at $230,000.

Mountain Property Development continued to borrow money through 2010 before eventually declaring bankruptcy in 2012.

Gibraltar, the distressed real estate investment arm of home-builder Toll Brothers, purchased the remaining Barn Village at Steamboat lots and brought them back on the market in 2013.

Because Lot 63A was collateral for a community housing fee, Steamboat Springs City Manager Deb Hinsvark said Thursday, Steamboat Springs City Council will have to take that into consideration when evaluating any future plans for the property.

Comments

The fact that the city would consider doing anything with the lot other than provide "affordable housing" just proves to the extent that inclusionary zoning was just a city government shakedown of developers.

If the objective was affordable housing then there would be no legal way for the city to do anything with the lot other than provide affordable housing.

I guess they are bound and determined to put the cops in a prime-time location, you know, now that they have radios and all the gizmos. Can't we find a nice country club for our beleaguered civil servants?

not so fast Scott (-;
"A sobering new study published by the Journal of Wine Economics — yes, there is a Journal of Wine Economics — finds that alcohol consumption in American states rises as the population’s politics becomes more liberal.

The study by Pavel Yakovlev and Walter P. Guessford of Duquesne University in Pennsylvania shows a direct correlation between political beliefs and the demand for alcohol. The study compares sales of alcoholic beverages against the political leanings of a state's members of Congress, as ranked by liberal organizations Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and the AFL-CIO Committee on Political Education (COPE)."

My observation leads me to conclude that liberal views have unintended consequences, and the result smells a lot like Communism. Daily we see the left working to eradicate views differing from their own, that results in COMMUNISM.

Fred,
Is it lack of sunshine, too little fiber in your diet or just early onset dementia that drives these comments containing an astounding amount of paranoia? I am sorry to be so blunt but moderation on both sides of issues is the ONLY thing that will keep this country moving forward---even at a slow pace. And once again your and other comments are totally off the topic of the article so I am calling it out! But, as long as we are off topic I read recently (and I will try and pull up the reference) that a full 55% of Americans, including myself, view themselves as independent voters--socially more liberal, ie: govt needs to stay out of the bedroom, and fiscally conservative, ie: no raising the debt ceiling without compromises on spending. The current POTUS has lost his "mojo" so is lame duck at best. The idea that he will be effective in driving his liberal agenda for the next 3 years is absurd. He is now in a position of playing"small ball" like trying to raise the minimum wage instead of addressing the bigger, more important issue of tax reform and speaks volumes about his current lack of popularity. At least a conservative had the nerve to propose sweeping tax reform against the judgement of his peers on both sides of the aisle. Communism? Go for a walk in the sunshine and re-think your comment . . . . .

"The fact that the city would consider doing anything with the lot other than provide "affordable housing" just proves to the extent that inclusionary zoning was just a city government shakedown of developers.

If the objective was affordable housing then there would be no legal way for the city to do anything with the lot other than provide affordable housing." --Scott W.

Scott is, of course, exactly right. Affordable Housing is nothing more than a shakedown which costs EVERYONE unecessarily in the long run.

Have you ever even READ the 10 pillars of the Communist Manifesto, Cindy?

1) Abolition of private property in land and application of all rents of land to public purpose.

The courts have interpreted the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution (1868) to give the government far more "eminent domain" power than was originally intended, Under the rubric of "eminent domain" and various zoning regulations, land use regulations by the Bureau of Land Managementproperty taxes, and "environmental" excuses, private property rights have become very diluted and private property in landis, vehicles, and other forms are seized almost every day in this country under the "forfeiture" provisions of the RICO statutes and the so-called War on Drugs.

3) Abolition of all rights of inheritance. (with the current death tax at what?? 55%... we are more than half way there, no??)

5) Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly. (did you know about the recent proposal to get the US Post Office into the Mortgage business?? Add that to Fannnie Mae and Freddie Mac and we are well on our way on this one too, no???)

9) Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the population over the country. (have you heard about the president's latest proposal to create "agriculture zones" that encourage population shifts toward areas that the gubbamint supposes need to be "encouraged"??)

That's six out of ten, and the other 4 are arguably comming into view over America's horizon.

You need to re-examine your history book, encyclopedia and dictionary, Cindy.

Communism is EXACTLY what it is.
10) Free education for all children in government schools. (we got that one down pat)

Oh, I forgot number 10... Government Education... THE Communist wet dream... What a great success the American "public fool system" has been, no? The communists laugh their asses off every time they think of the success they had destroying this country through our endoctrination centers called "schools"...

And then there's the pervasive tendency of communist states to dis-allow private gun ownership. One can see almost daily examples around the world of abuses of individuals by states which have disallowed private gun ownership; today's headline example is in Ukraine. People there being slapped around by thugs... COMMUNIST thugs, FOREIGN, INVADING COMMUNIST THUGS... and they have no means of self-defense.

The state that promised to protect them is the one killing them or, at the very least, stepping aside and allowind others to do so...

Sadly another thread of comments on this forum has disintegrated into a grand debate about nothing whatsoever to do with the story.

I'm in the opinion that the posters to this forum are doing a disservice to the community by dominating the forum with these pointless debates.

I urge the Pilot and Today to manage their forum to eliminate posts to stories that are off topic, and free up this forum of these long winded discussions that I feel restrict others from commenting, and sharing their opinions on the local issues within the story
. I feel once these forums fall back into these debates, normal citizens who may want to post an opinion on the story do not due to the ongoing discussion from the dominate posters.

Please Pilot, take control of your forum so it can be use by everyone to express opinions on the local stories, and delete posts that go off topic, and are arguments leading to nowhere.

Please posters, can we stay on topic, quit debating so far off the topics in the stories, and walk away once a opinion is established so that others posters can feel open to express their opinions without getting blasted by the over posting dominate voices.

The paper doesn't enforce terms of service of stopping personal attacks so there is no reason to believe they would do anything about off topic posts. People who talk to me about these forums say they do not post because of fear of nasty personal responses.

The joke on Mark Hartless is that the communists got the idea of universal free education from the United States. The United States recognized the importance of having an educated population and the communists also saw that as a good idea. So it takes a particularly bizarre form of anti-logic to be against public education in the US because the communists also support public education.

Oz I am not against public education. I am against the quality of public education. From 1950 to 1962 when I obtained my public education it was of a good quality. Just about then liberals like yourself started taking over public education and even you can see the quality of the product now. From 1962 to 1965 when I recieved my B.S. in Engineering the liberals were starting to take over the Colleges. Since this was a College that had built its reputation on engineering they made little progress while I was there. I am sure they run the place now although since it is in Texas, maybe they do not have complete control. China is now seeing the value of capitalism as we march towards communism. Maybe some day we will be one happy world sitting around a campfire because we have eliminated coal fired power plants.

They perfected it and exported it back to the US in the 1950's and '60's, Scott.

“This new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take over youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing.” (Hitler)

I wonder if people like Pat ever have conversations in real life in which they condemn other participants for taking the conversation off into topics other than the original comment...

If you have something to say about the Barn Village then spill it, Pat. Nobody is stopping you.

What I find really sad is that this society seems so dominated by it's "feelings" that it is affraid to express them outside of a group that likely already agrees with them and will not hurt their "feelings".

It is sad, really. How does one dominate a forum with apparent limitless ability to post comments????

How?? What about posting items from the communist manifesto on a FORUM about the city's barn village lot.
This should be a FORUM regarding the stories published by the Pilot, not a conversation between loney locals that do not know the difference between an online Forum and a Chatroom.
I don't condemn people I'm having a discussion with when they go off topic, but if I'm say, in charge of an HOA meeting and we are discussing a topic, and the discussion trends away from the business of the HOA, I will direct the discussion back to the topic. The Pilot should be doing this and it's an embarrassment to their "journalism" to allow these chat rooms to run wild.

Try to leave this forum alone for 30 days, you can lurk, laugh, and whatever, but don't post.
I dare ScottW, MarkH, JerryC, FredD, and all the others that post 3-4 times a day to leave and see what could be of this forum without the 5-6 of you posting onto every story. The forum will survive without your voices.

I didn't post for all of January, and will now drop back out, I urge others to find another outlet for your rhetoric and allow new voices to speak on this forum without your aggressive posting.

There has been 36 minutes since you "spoke". Nobody "spoke" in that time.There were 4hrs-25min before that for anyone to "speak" about anything they wanted... including the Barn Village.

In that entire 5 hr time period, nobody posted one word about the Barn Village, including YOU. Pat.

Your entire post was about a subject other than the Barn Village...

You are right. I don't know the diff. between an online forum and a chatroom. And YOU don't know the difference between a civil disagreement and a personal attack. You (and others) take much or all of what is said here (by me and others) as an attack on you personally. That is your prerogative, but does not mean our opinions are invalid or that they must wait till the headline clears us to verbalize the exact thoughts generated by the conversation.

Dang, all these haters, poking jabs back and forth... mind if I return the subject to the topic at hand, if just for a moment?

I was just going to say, it's possibly more than coincidence how this land just plopped itself into the City's hands, right when we're supposedly looking for a new police department location (some of us haven't abandoned a major makeover) and I'd be really curious, who might personally profit from this new course. Besides the architects, lawyers, and contractors, the feasibility study and Environmental Impact Statement, two special committees...

I'm sure that when Mud Season gets here and my life shrivels to nothing again, I will have a digression or two for you; I just hope to make them entertaining.

As far as where to put the cops... I think we could commandeer the whole back row at Dream Island via Eminent Domain at a quite reasonable price -- and they'd be right where the action is, the jail a short hop away.